The secret of Mino Monta’s success

Japanese TV host Mino Monta was recently inducted into the Guinness Book of World Records for “most live hours on the tube by a TV host.” Mino, who according to Japanese media reports was drunk at the ceremony, used the opportunity to declare his intentions to expand his TV appearances to night broadcasts.
That’s too bad for some people, since judging from the reaction at FG and No-sword, foreigners in Japan are kind of sick of seeing the man. Many Japanese (“way to go!“) on the other hand, predictably have a soft spot in their hearts for the bland, Regis Philbin-esque commentator who is famous for giving schmaltzy but stern advice to old ladies who can’t get along with their daughters-in-law every weekday afternoon on his “Bold live phone calls” segment.

Still, one wonders just how he gets the energy to appear lucid for 21 hours a week on live TV. Back in June of last year, Mino-san made headlines after announcing a curious part of his morning routine:

In a back-and-forth with a female announcer, Mino-san made one of his usual health-related comments, “The yeast in beer improves your immune system.” He then admitted to viewers that every morning he drinks a 50-50 mixture of beer and tomato juice every morning to stay healthy.

Now, I’ve never tried this before, but it sounds even more disgusting than Shinzo Abe’s beloved tree kale juice. Adamu’s personal recommendation: a 25-75 mix of Sprite and Corona, preferably taken late at night. It goes down very smooth, though I can’t exactly call something like that healthy.

To close out I’ll post a hilarious video of Mino’s phone call program (in Japanese but can be enjoyed by all the world) that No-sword was nice enough to find on YouTube:

7 thoughts on “The secret of Mino Monta’s success”

  1. “drinks a 50-50 mixture of beer and tomato juice every morning…Now, I’ve never tried this before, but it sounds even more disgusting than Shinzo Abe’s beloved tree kale juice.”

    You can buy this at any bar in Japan. It’s called a Red Eye. A lot of late night partiers swear by them.

  2. To be honest, despite the snarky title of that post, I’m not really sick of him. I don’t really watch enough TV, especially his main programs, to even see him that much. And when I do see him, he’s inoffensive enough. But, on the other hand, I can’t claim to have a soft spot in my heart for him, either. He’s really more like scenery to me than anything else.

    I have to give it up to the guy for being hard-working, though. Even when he’s on the phone, he never seems to be phoning it in.

  3. He’s kinda an ass. After the killing of a 7 year old girl in Hiroshima by a Peruvian last year he said that we have to “watch out for foreigners” or something like that. The newspapers were very reserved in their reporting (little anti-foreign stuff outside of the Sankei) and the TV coverage was bland, but he just can’t shut his mouth.

    On the subject of TV idiots — The book “Contemporary Japan and Popular Culture” quotes Dave Specter as having told a bunch of racist jokes about black people on Japanese TV. Before, I thought that he was a jackass, but now….

  4. “After the killing of a 7 year old girl in Hiroshima by a Peruvian last year he said that we have to “watch out for foreigners” or something like that. The newspapers were very reserved in their reporting (little anti-foreign stuff outside of the Sankei) and the TV coverage was bland”

    Hmmm. I seem to remember that all the TV and newspaper reports used the killer’s Peruvian name (despite the fact that his official name was Japanese in origin). Correct me if I’m wrong, but I saw that as an explicit marking out of the guy as “foreign”.

  5. Maybe he used his Peruvian name in all non-official contexts. If he didn’t actually introduce himself to people using his Japanese name, I don’t see this as being discriminatory. All speculation of course.

  6. The Associated Press and Canada’s “Globe and Mail” among others, marked him as Peruvian in headlines as well. I didn’t like that much. However, you have to admit that there is a big difference between this (describing a foreign national as a foreign national) and talking about “watch out for foreigners”. The Asahi, for example, said “We can’t let a crime committed by a foreigner turn into anti-foreign hysteria”. Just what was needed. There were also a few great articles connected to the case in Shukan Bunshun and Chuokoron about how foreign crimes are NOT increasing as much as the police statistics suggest. The real debate that took place after the killing of the girl in Hiroshima was how to keep Japanese children safe, not (thankfuly) how to keep them safe from “foreigners”. The “foreign crime” connection was hardly made (outside of one nasty Sankei editorial and Mino the jackass) apart from the identification of the victimizer as Peruvian (which was A – true, and B – not something that is unique in Japan as the AP English-language reporting of the very same even suggests). I think that this is just what the Japanese press needs to do — a crime is committed by a foreigner and instead of an US VS. THEM reaction, we get something (victimization of children) being talked about as a social trend in Japan, not something brought to Japan by foreigners.

    There are plenty of examples (Korean pickpockets, etc.) where the Japanese press goes overboard on the foreign example but a survey of the media’s handling of the Peruvian case shows some real balance and a nice step forward.

  7. In any case, the dude turned out to not be a Nikkei at all (faked documents). I think that his real name is Pizarro (sp?) but he was first called Carlos Yagi or Yagi Carlos. I think that the media katakana-ed his name because they were not sure which name was first and which was last (I saw both orders).

    In any case, a week later and American woman was attacked and stabbed in Tokyo and she was clearly identified as American in the headlines. Discrimination? Or does it make sense to make those kinds of distinctions in a country where people will automatically understand a criminal or suspect or victim to be “Japanese” unless they get more information?

    The press was all over the Hiroshima killing and everyone was assuming that the killer was the same type of young, creepy, Japanese male that had been involved in a similar muder in Nara a year before. So it was a big surprise when it turned out to be a Peruvian. I’m just glad that the media did not start beating the foreign crime issue over the head. I see a big difference between how the media reports on “foreign crime” (ie. police stats that they blow out of proportion) and individual foreign crimes (can be talked about in terms of a Japanese social problem like the victimization of children).

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